WILLIAM WALKER MUST STAY IN KOSOVO - PETRISCH

PRISTINA, Jan 19 (Hina) - Head of the Verification Mission of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), William Walker, must stay in Kosovo. The international community supports this idea, and holds the decision of Yugoslav authorities that he should be banned as unacceptable. This decision should be reversed, European Union's special envoy, Austrian Ambassador in Belgrade, Wolfgang Petrisch, said in Pristina on Tuesday. Petrisch held talks in Kosovo with deputy head of the OSCE Verification Mission, Gabriel Keller and leader of Kosovo Albanians Ibrahim Rugova. He said he had talked with Rugova about efforts to establish a unified Albanian negotiation team for talks with Yugoslav authorities. Despite the rise in tensions in Kosovo and negotiation blockades, Rugova expressed readiness to establish a unified negotiating team, Petrisch said. He expressed conviction that members of the Kosovo Liberation Army would, despite the massacre of Albanians in the village of Racak, join in the negotiations. Petrisch did not comment on what he had talked about with Keller at the OSCE centre in Pristina. (hina) lml jn